sy barroom there was sudden silence, save for
responsive murmurs of 'Tonio's name, for strange sympathy had come
sifting in from the columns afield. But Craney had heard in the
adjoining room and was up in an instant, Watts following suit. This
would never do. This was disloyalty to the best and gentlest and most
courteous of post commanders, and no soldier should, no employe of his
_could_, drink such a toast within Craney's doors. But he need not have
feared. Promptly a big sergeant had interposed, and caught the corporal
by the wrist, with thunderous "None of that, Dooley!" Prompt came
Case's answer, though low-toned and guarded: "I'm drinking nothing,
man, till after pay-day. _Then_ come at me and I'll settle it with you
drink for drink."

But Dooley's Irish blood was up, five fingers of tanglefoot tingling in
each fist and bubbling in his brain. Struggling in the sergeant's
grasp, he shouted his reply: "Settle be damned! How'd _you_ settle wid
Willett for the girl he did you out? Bluffed him on a queen high, and
called it square! You're nothin' but a bluffer, Case, an' all Vancouver
knowed it!" In the instant of awkward, amazed silence that followed no
man moved. Then, his face still whiter, his lips livid, Case turned to
Sergeant Woodrow. "That man has no right to be heard here--much less to
be wearing chevrons," said he. "His name's Quigley, a deserter from the
Lost and Strayed!"

It was then just midnight, and the sergeant of the guard, coming to
close the festivities, went back with an unlooked-for prisoner, who,
every inch of the way, cursed and foamed and fought, and swore hideous
vengeance on Case for a cur and a coward, so that the fury of his
denunciation reached even the general's quarters, where peace and
congratulation were having sway, and lovers were still whispering ere
parting for the night--reached even the ears of Willett himself,
reclining blissfully at the open window, with Lilian's hand in his, her
fair head pillowed on his shoulder. There in the open hearth lay the
ashes of the letters, unread, unopened, that had come to accuse him,
but even the fires of hell could not burn out the memory of the wrong
that, after all, had tracked him here unerringly, for in the few
half-drunken, all-damning words that reached him, Harold Willett heard
the trumpeting of his own disgrace. His sin had found him out.

And, barely an hour before, he had sworn to her that the Stella of whom
he had babbled in his